Dominic Finocchio’s paintings reexamine the modern male, blending traditional elements with contemporary subjects. Despite their social settings, his figures are distant, hidden behind their contemplative faces and closed body language. These resulting tableaus portray an awkward, uncomfortable, or even repressed masculinity.

“Dreams have been described as a chain of image fragments drawn from memory, driven by desire and not subject to free will; a description that points to a similarity with the images shown here.

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Though my most recent works are categorically narrative they do not represent a specific idea or incident. After an often-lengthy preparatory process of building a composition that begins with arbitrary choices and a focus on formal concerns, the figures and the depicted environment into which they are placed are chosen when all the disparate elements cohere and develop an apparent pictorial logic with agreeable specificity.

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Because I do not determine beforehand what the image can, should or will convey, it will always be something unforeseen. Some works will offer an invitation to simply have a visual experience that cannot or need not be explained, while other works will present ambiguity and indeterminacy that may ask a viewer to explore, interpret or analyze the image. 

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This process allows me to rely on intuition in an effort to chance upon the unexpected. My hope is that I will give viewers an image that is persuasive, purposeful and compelling.​” - Artist Statement